The office family

THE OFFICE PSYCHOLOGIST

by JOHN NAISH

Thursday September 30 2004, 1.00am, The Times

by JOHN NAISH

Thursday September 30 2004, 1.00am, The Times

THE cliché about corporations being one big family is true, according to a Harvard Business Review report this month — it says companies can be one big dysfunctional family. So where do you fit in? The Harvard report warns managers that they are not simply bosses in the eyes of their staff: they are surrogate parents, and may be seen as emotionally distant fathers, clinging mothers, wicked stepmums — depending largely on what relationship the staff member had with his or her real-life ma and pa. Yes, we are talking issues here. Big, hoary, unresolved ones.

Philip Larkin should have written: “They f*** you up, your mum and dad and your line manager . . .” Remember that appraisal that made you angry: was it